Most musicians know that in order to be well-disciplined and to have a smoother performance, they need to first warm-up with scales and arpeggios. A lot of them dread this or think it's boring, especially beginning music students. Of course, to make these essential exercises a little more intriguing, we can add dynamics (piano, forte, crescendo, diminuendo), articulation (legato, staccato, accents) and rhythms to liven up this monotonous drill. This method of spicing up scales can also further prepare a musician for an actual style of playing in whatever piece they're studying. Furthermore, what some musicians don't realize is that they are playing these in their music more often than not! For example, I started one student on a traditional Christmas song, "Joy to the World" (I know: really early as of mid-November, but it came up in our lesson book). If you simply study the melody, all it really is is a descending scale pattern, with a rhythm of mixed note values. Also a few months back I joined a local rock band. As we were listening to Queen's "I Want It All", I noticed that it had arpeggios in the keyboard part based on the harmonies in the chord chart. Of course I instantly recognized the familiar pattern! I even jokingly said to my band mates that I would tell my students that here is a prime example of arpeggios in REAL MUSIC, but here I am telling the whole world! I could go on and on of countless examples of both arpeggios and scales in songs and pieces, but this post would be too long. I just wanted to quickly give you all an idea of how these fundamental exercises and warm ups can be expressed in everyday music.
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About this blogHello world, this is your friendly musician friend and teacher, Joseph! This is where I share my thoughts and feelings about anything and everything music-related. Enjoy! Archives
September 2022
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